On the same day this week that Russia by its own admission bombed a maternity hospital in Ukraine, an Irish MEP tweeted out a speech she made in the European Parliament denouncing the world’s obsession with the Ukrainian conflict.
Lest we be accused of misquoting or misrepresenting her, here are Clare Daly’s remarks in full, as publicised by herself:
Meanwhile in Afghanistan… tens of thousands seeking refuge; five million children facing famine; 500% increase in child marriages; children being sold to feed families… Not a mention of it.
My god, they must be wondering what makes their humanitarian crisis so unimportant. pic.twitter.com/VtDk5awWwk
— Clare Daly (@ClareDalyMEP) March 8, 2022
What Daly is saying here is not hard to understand, nor is it hard to fairly summarise: She claims that the west is lead by hypocrites who care about atrocities only selectively, when they fit within a pre-set agenda. We’re all very annoyed about dead Ukrainian children, she claims, but not so much about the ongoing crisis in Afghanistan, or global child poverty, and the various alleged crimes of Israel and NATO, and so on, and so forth.
The allegation is wrapped up neatly within an ideological worldview that says that telling people to care about the war in Ukraine is a convenient vehicle to advance the militaristic goals of NATO imperialists, against which, coincidentally, Vladimir Putin claims his soldiers are bravely fighting.
The problem with this particular claim of hypocrisy is, ironically enough, how hypocritical it is itself. This is the same Clare Daly, after all, who has been protesting American wars, real and imagined, for her whole public life. The same Clare Daly who is one of Ireland’s most active pro-Palestinian voices and activists.
But you will not find any example of Clare Daly – or her partner in cynicism, Mick Wallace – making a speech like this about the USA or Israel. Think back to the most recent conflict in Gaza, for a moment, which captured Irish attention almost fully and led the news here most nights. Did Clare Daly, during that conflict, chide western or Irish viewers for caring too much about the plight of the Palestinians, and not enough about world hunger in general? Did she say then, while everybody was talking about Gaza, that starving children “must be wondering what makes their humanitarian crisis so unimportant”?
Spoiler: She did not. She had no issue temporarily focusing solely on just one war when it suited her.
What about during the Iraq war, or its aftermath? Did she ever say “of course we should oppose all conflicts, but why the obsessive focus on this one?”
The fact of the matter is that Daly has no difficulty whatever with obsessive international focus on a local conflict for so long as that focus is one she shares. If there is a chance to bash the west or Israel, then her concern for the starving children of the world can be set aside, happily enough. But in the case of Putin’s war? Suddenly we must all focus somewhere else.
It’s not only cynical – it’s actively revolting. Because what Daly is doing here is not, actually, to try to focus attention on suffering elsewhere. What she is trying to do is to use suffering elsewhere to paint over the bloodshed in Ukraine. “Don’t look here. Look there”.
The fact of the matter, when it comes to Daly and Wallace, is that in recent years they have become worse than useful idiots for Russia. A useful idiot, after all, is just that: An idiot. Daly and Wallace are not idiots. They are very consciously trying to deflect attention, anger, and blame from the Russians, and onto somebody – anybody – else.
This fits a pattern. When Vladimir Putin locked up a democratic opponent, Alexei Navalny, two years ago, Daly made a speech defending him. When Putin obliterated Aleppo, in Syria – a crime which ironically didn’t get much western attention – Daly defended him. Her behaviour here fits into a pattern, which is that she will always deflect blame from Russia, but that she will never deflect blame from a western country or alliance.
The Irish voters have a right to elect whomsoever they choose to the European Parliament. But perhaps before we vote the next time, we might ask ourselves a simple question: When was the last time we heard either of these two raise any issue of importance to Dublin, or Ireland South, respectively, in the European Parliament?
They were elected to represent the views of Irish people. They appear instead to be more interested in representing the views of the President of Russia.